John Miner's
Suzuki LJ80 Project
Brisbane Queensland
Australia
Ph: 0421 046273 |
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I now have a large range of
LJ80 and Vitara parts (no body panels left) and I will soon be wrecking
an LJ50.
email for prices
johneminer@gmail.com
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My daily drive is a Suzuki Sierra (Samurai) with a Suzuki Vitara motor &
gearbox.
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The project for 2010 is a LJ80 rebuild with a small block V8 motor if I
can get it in.
It's going to need some serious reinforcing and component upgrades
(suspension, brakes, steering etc).
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THE NEW PROJECT
I was looking at ways to upgrade the
performance and safety of the LJ80.
I thought about fitting Vitara independent
suspension etc but after looking into it I decided to fit the LJ80 body onto
a Vitara rolling chassis.
PHOTOS HERE
About the original Project
The original project started in March 2004 when I bought a soft top LJ80
for $600
which was a little too expensive but it was the first soft top I
had seen that wasn't
rusted out.
This car wasn't running and it had quite a lot of rust, but it was
repairable (I used a
full 6' x 4' sheet
of steel plate in the build), and it had all new tyres.
Over the next few week I bought 2 other LJ80's for parts, one
was a hard top
LJ80V, this had had a lot of new parts
fitted but had a blown motor. The other car was
completely rusted out and
ultimately had very few parts of use.
The owner of the hardtop had bought a 1000cc Suzuki Sierra motor to
replace the blown
motor and he included this in the deal. It was also fitted
with expensive shocks and
steering damper etc ($3000 worth).
I made a few improvements to the new motor including electronic ignition
& exhaust
headers.
The bonnet and back swing door (with the spare tyre on it) had to be almost
completely
rebuilt because of major rust and dent damage.
Modifications to the car include
a body lift of 2
inches, gas shocks all around, I fitted
disc brakes on the front and a A frame (for towing
the LJ80 behind our motorhome).
I may put the fittings back for the original soft top
although I have had a small soft top
made to keep the rain off the head.
I also up-graded the seats.
I made 2 lockable boxes for storage. One is between the seats which also
makes a good
armrest (I padded the top) and the other one sits in the back
and carries recover gear,
camping equipment and spare oil and water etc.
I recently fitted a UHF 2 way radio and a CD player/Radio with 4 speakers.
I had the centres of the wheels cut and and reversed the rims to widen the
wheel base,
I also fitted spaces to make them slightly wider, It will now
climb trees (well almost!).
I had budgeted $1500 for the
build and blew the budget in the first month, I lost track
of how much I
spent (I stopped counting after $4000).
I have a lot of parts left over and most are for sale. I also have a
workshop manual
for the LJ80 and one for a LJ50, These are available 0n CD for $19.95 plus
postage
(or can be emailed). Both are on the same CD.
http://kobu.com
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